On which planet or moon in our solar system will some kind of life be found.

[Jan]

Knowing that we have some kind of activity going on on some of the planets and moons in out solar system, which one is going to be found to have some kind of life (but perhaps not as we know it)?

I'd take Venus as it has plenty of lightning going on, which I think is needed to kickstart life. Then again, the name Enceladus just sounds cool.

[VelesHomais]

Enceladus


Illustration Credit & Copyright: Michael Carroll

[Jan]

One of the most amazing fun facts I know is that Saturn's rings are generally about 10 meters thick. That even beats that 1 pixel width in the image above.

[FREKI]

Based on how long Mars had warm liquid oceans, geological activity and a proper magnetosphere ( basically all that earth had when RND and Lipids evolved to DNA holding cells ) that is my best bet..

While conditions in the later couple billion years have turned rather hostile we can see just how well life here on Earth thrives in even the most extreme conditions and with the traces of methane found on Mars there's a good chance there's still some life left up there..

[VelesHomais]

I actually think that we will find life on Enceladus, Mars, Europa, and Titan. Let's not forget that there's even strong evidence now for liquid cyclically flowing water on Mars. But there will be debate as to whether what we have found constitutes life or not.

[_BPS_]

Which planet?

Whichever one contains all the following elements in abundant quantities: nitrogen, sulphur, oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon (regardless of their molecular form).

Just because a planet has water on it doesn't mean that life can form on it (at least not from the science we know of today).

[gramercy]

enceladus, europa or titan

and i want it to be with a different genetics than ours

[Fab87]

Enceladus. Since the planet is spilling liquids into space, it will be relatively easy to collect samples of microbiological life, if there is one. The same doesn't apply to Europa, where we would have to drill through km of ice.

P.S. the name enceladus reminds me of enchiladas and makes me hungry.

[Dmerdude]

Europa have the widest-range of life, besides Earth, I think. But we may go to Mars first and find a bacteria.

[wjfox]

Beyond Earth, I doubt there's life anywhere in our Solar System. The environments are simply too hostile.

But the Galaxy is probably teeming with bacterial life.

Multicellular organisms will be much rarer - perhaps a few hundred, or a few thousand planets per galaxy?

Intelligent lifeforms rarer still... one or two per cluster of galaxies, perhaps.

[RTM84]

The most likely candidate is Jupiters moon Europa, due to the vulcanic activity combined with the oceans underneath the ice.
Life on earth may very well have started deep in the ocean on the vulcanic parts of the seabottom.

Intelligent lifeforms rarer still... one or two per cluster of galaxies, perhaps.

My personall estimate is that we have at least (a few) dozen of intelligent civilizations per galaxy at present time.
The latest estimate for the number of planets within our galaxy alone is more than 200. billion.

My estimate for intelligent life in our galaxy will go up dramaticly if we find life within our own solar system. If there is other life so close to earth than it is likely that life is very common and takes hold easely even if the circumstances are not as favourable as they are on earth.

[mopc]

Nowhere. There is no life outside the Earth in the solar system. It's signature chemicals would have been detected by now.

[_BPS_]

Originally Posted by mopc

Nowhere. There is no life outside the Earth in the solar system. It's signature chemicals would have been detected by now.

Signature chemicals?

[AnOldBlackMarble]

My favorite place to find life would be Europa because there life would have the option of becoming multicellular. It would be great if we could find something like a sea of crazy looking underwater alien animals. But I highly doubt it since photosynthesis is not possible there, although if it has hydrothermal vents... well who knows.

I've also got a thing for Venus, but she's just a little to hot for me. I'd love the idea of terraforming Venus, and impregnating her with some life, but she is such a hot head I don't know if we'll ever get a shot.

[Dmerdude]

Originally Posted by mopc

Nowhere. There is no life outside the Earth in the solar system. It's signature chemicals would have been detected by now.

[Dmerdude]

Originally Posted by _BPS_

Signature chemicals?

He made that up. There is spectroscopy but that doesn't support what he said.

[VelesHomais]

I would prefer life on Titan, because it would have the most chances for complex evolution, if it is indeed possible for life to exist there. There are a multitude of strange environments there, even an underground water ocean.

[Alterlee]

Life is fairly complicated and varied category. It is quite possible that we will find life in abundance throughout entire Solar system, most likely in form of microbes and microbial colonies and maybe even some primitive fungus, like mold, and plant life.

[VelesHomais]

I highly doubt that plant life is possible anywhere in the Solar System outside Earth, but microscopic extremophiles could exist in localized ecosystems.

[CanadianDemon]

Originally Posted by AnOldBlackMarble

My favorite place to find life would be Europa because there life would have the option of becoming multicellular. It would be great if we could find something like a sea of crazy looking underwater alien animals. But I highly doubt it since photosynthesis is not possible there, although if it has hydrothermal vents... well who knows.

I've also got a thing for Venus, but she's just a little to hot for me. I'd love the idea of terraforming Venus, and impregnating her with some life, but she is such a hot head I don't know if we'll ever get a shot.

Have you not ever heard of Chemosynthesis?